What will the internet of the future make possible? Untethering the Web explores the technologies, strategies, and anxieties that are coalescing in 2022 to shape a new digital paradigm. As naturalized citizens of today’s always-online world and as survivors of a multi-year pandemic, the need to reform our digital tools and approaches is more pressing than ever before. Evolved models for virtual convening, collective organizing, and digital ownership are making this possible, and a reckoning for the platformed web and its monolithic tech giants is beginning to feel imminent—but how will it all unfold, and what new pitfalls will emerge? In conjunction with Pioneer Works’ seventh Software for Artists Day, happening in October, 2022, creators, technologists, and members of our community share their visions for a flourishing digital multiverse, plus how they imagine it manifesting over time.

Software for Artists Book: Untethering the Web is edited by Willa Köerner & Tommy Martinez featuring contributions from Jace Clayton, Aria Dean, Mat Dryhurst, Nora N. Khan, Jenson Leonard, Umber Majeed, Trevor McFedries, Everest Pipkin, Billy Rennekamp, Mindy Seu—plus 32 Digital Diary entries from our community.

About Software for Artists Book series

Driven by a desire to challenge existing frameworks and present creative alternatives, the Software for Artists Book series explores our complex and often slippery relationships with new technologies. Each book features the voices of critically engaged artists, researchers, writers, and organizers who are working at the forefront of the web, virtual embodiment, decentralized networks, AI, and beyond.